Role Play(c) by Michael Casey

Role Play ©

By Michael Casey

I was just talking to a FB friend and as ever I had an idea after I was talking to him. So I’m going to share it with you. Now how many of you have done Role Play while on training courses?

It can be very daunting, embarrassing even, like being asked to strip in the class room, or in the middle of the sports field. I hurry to say that’s NOT what I want any of you to do.

I’ve done a bit of role play on training courses, and remember as a writer I’ve written a play or two. But there through  my words others are doing the stripping in public. They are the actors, I’m the writer/director.

I’ve been on training courses to help company moral by binding the staff together. To teach customer service, to teach my students a few lessons in life, even to learn how to be a bookie.

So when I became an Esol teacher I had a variety of experience, I’d done all kinds of everything. I boasted I’d written a book, now I have 6 to my name. So how do you use words?

Well I’m a firm believer in making lessons fun, though I do have to say you have to balance it so the students don’t think that learning is a joke, or that you are just a clown. You have to get the balance right. It’s like pushing a swing, gentle pushes at first then gradually you get the big swing. You do have to make sure you don’t push so hard that your wife/girlfriend/children go flying into space or get wrapped around the swing structure.

You need a lesson play, well you should have one, if you are very clever a flow chart will do. Now say for 15 mins you tell the students they are going to pretend to be Harry, William and Kate, with the class pretending to be baby George gurgling in the background. So the students put on their best posh accents and talk about babies, and car seats and all kind of everything.

During this you the teacher write any vocabulary on the white board. So the students have fun learning to speak clear English. Then the class can discuss the role play, and any associated vocabulary. Now I’ve chosen the Royals as they are very topical at the moment.

Wayne Rooney would make a great role play, him and the Special One, the Chelsea manager with the Man U manager too. So the role play would be the 3 of them having a coffee in StarBucks to decide Wayne’s future. This would be a fun activity, with vocabulary being added to the white board, you could also suggest vocabulary as the role play continues. I imagine, numbers very  high numbers would be involved. £35,000,000 would be one of the numbers.

Role play for the girls in class could revolve around picking a Wedding dress, and/or organising a full celebration. Everything down to the cake and disco and whatever. Word appropriate language would be learnt.

Remember they are learning English as a 2^nd language. Hopefully once they have learnt English they’ll visit and come and spend some money in England. Certainly Chinese students will go to Bister Village and buy 4 LV bags each, I am told they are too expensive in Shanghai.

As a teacher sometimes you need to teach something that can only be done via role play. I wrote a role play for our students about time keeping. I got the 3 other teachers to perform it. I pretended it would just be me teaching that session to the 120 students. Then one by one the other teachers arrived and started to disrupt the lesson. I have to admit I started to laugh like a nervous girl.

After a couple of minutes the students realised what was going on. We proceeded with the role play. Say twenty minutes later I stopped, then we divided into our groups then you talk about the role play. A simple thing but it works. As for the 10 people the lesson was really aimed at, they missed it, they had arrived late.

I also wrote a role play about interviews and interview technique, so the students would have an idea of how you do it in England. So I was the interviewer, and the 3 other teachers were the good, the bad and the ugly candidates. Now for some who have never had an interview in their life this is a great role play. It informs and they learn some vocabulary by watching it and during the discussion afterwards.

You have the perfect candidate, in a suit and on time. You have the average candidate, and then you have the guy who should have stayed in bed. The last guy looked like he has been in bed with his clothes on. The teacher had his shirt hanging out and was wearing a baseball cap. I could explain all this in detail, but I’ll leave that for another time.

Once the teachers had their interviews I interviewed a few of the students, while the 120 looked on. Now this is play learning if you like. My own play Shoplife as well as being a very funny play, could also be turned on its head to teach Customer Service on a Laugh and Learn basis. With English Language students you can teach through laughter. I am  available  if any training company wants to use my skills.

There is a balance that has to be maintained between all fun and no work, and all work and no fun. I think I got it right in my teaching days. Hopefully my playwright days are beckoning, for the role as writer is my best stage.